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(view spoiler)[I've just finished the book and still don't understand what albakin's final words meant "The beasts came in and stood by the door".The only explanation it occurs to me now is "the wanderers almost completed their plan", because albakin went back to the museum without a reason. But I think I'm not seeing other meanings...like one that would subscribe the beetle in the anthill theory.What is your opinion about it? (hide spoiler)]["br"]>["br"]>

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This is my favorite book by Boris And Arkady Strugatsky and most probably favorite science fiction book overall. Main idea: no matter how kind and fair a World is, creating Secrete Service leads to death of an innocent people. It does so even when original purpose of its creation is good and people who serve in it are nice and fair. In this sense "Beetle in the Anthill" and "Homeland" (TV series) have very much in common...Events take place in so-called "Noon World" - sci-fi utopia, distant futuThis is my favorite book by Boris And Arkady Strugatsky and most probably favorite science fiction book overall. Main idea: no matter how kind and fair a World is, creating Secrete Service leads to death of an innocent people. It does so even when original purpose of its creation is good and people who serve in it are nice and fair. In this sense "Beetle in the Anthill" and "Homeland" (TV series) have very much in common...Events take place in so-called "Noon World" - sci-fi utopia, distant future, when all the men are kind and powerful, ultimate science achievements provided people with infinite wealth, with no money, no poverty, no greed, long healthy lives and star travels all around Universe with a mission to help other civilizations to succeed. Everything is fine. Basically John Lennon got it right in "imagine".Maksim Cammerer, who serves for COMCON-2 - newly created secret service with a mission to protect Earth from unwanted intrusions, receives important assignment - he has to find a "progressor" (that's how those people who serve on distant stars are called), Lev Abalkin. He suddenly run away from a planet where he was planted, killed another "progressor" (which is something unbelievable for people of Noon World - there is no crime) and hides somewhere on Earth. Maksim quickly realizes there is something way more important here then rabid "progressor". Lev Abalkin has very weird biography, his parents are unknown, he never really had friends, and it seems like it was forbidden for him to live on Earth (which is also completely unprecedented)... Now not giving everything away, I just wanna say that I love this book and definitely recommend it to everyone who didn't have a chance to read it yet - you'll have a lot of fun and that bittersweet ending... I promise you won't regret it and if you will indeed - there are more books by Strugatskies about "Noon World" so it's a fun with continuation.

The Wanderers traveled all over the galaxy, and -- who knows? -- perhaps beyond. All this happened some thousands of years ago. After all this time, no one knows what the Wanderers look like, even whether they were humanoid or not. Arkady and Boris Strugatsky wrote about what they referred to as the Noon Universe, as described below by the Wikipedia article about the brothers:

The main characteristics of the Noon Universe are: a very high level of social, scientific, and technological development

The Wanderers traveled all over the galaxy, and -- who knows? -- perhaps beyond. All this happened some thousands of years ago. After all this time, no one knows what the Wanderers look like, even whether they were humanoid or not. Arkady and Boris Strugatsky wrote about what they referred to as the Noon Universe, as described below by the Wikipedia article about the brothers:

The main characteristics of the Noon Universe are: a very high level of social, scientific, and technological development; the creativity of the general population; and the very significant level of societal maturity compared to the modern world. For instance, this world knows no monetary stimulation (indeed, money does not exist), and every person is engaged in a profession that interests him or her. The Earth of the Noon Universe is governed by a global meritocratic council composed of the world's leading scientists and philosophers. That Noon World has been clearly named as "World of Communism" in their novels, which was handy for publishing their novels in the USSR where the Communist Party decided whether a book would be printed, and approved for mass circulation.

The Universe was described by the authors as the world in which they would like to live and work. It became highly influential for at least a generation of Soviet people, e.g. a person could quote the Strugatsky books and be sure of being understood. At first the authors thought that the Noon Universe would become reality "by itself", but then they realized that the only way to achieve it is by inventing the High Theory of Upbringing, making the upbringing of each person a unique deed.

One of the important story arcs of those books is how the advanced human civilization covertly steers the development of those considered less advanced. Agents of humans are known as Progressors. At the same time, some humans suspect that a very advanced spacefaring race called Wanderers exists and is 'progressing' humanity itself.

In Beetle in the Anthill, we are presented with a relentless search for one Lev Albakin, one of the Progressors described above, who has killed an associate and traveled to earth without permission.

For me, however, the very best parts of the book are excerpted from a journal by Lev in which he and a doglike extraterrestrial named Schokn, who seems attached to Lev but who thinks little of the human race: "Humans. How can there be any doubt? Naturally, it was humans. Iron and fire, rubble, it's always the same." As in their great Roadside Picnic, there are wonderful outland scenes in which inexplicable things, things that can only be described as eldritch. They wandered across a ruined landscape, where strange objects and threats materialize seemingly from nowhere, and they are treated with suspicion by the surviving human population, who are affected by a plague that makes them age prematurely.

The Strugatsky brothers are not for your typical sci-fi fan: Beetle in the Anthill is a mystery wrapped within an enigma, and the tale unfolds slowly in a series of fragments, mostly from the point of view of Maxim Kammerer, who is seeking the Progressor Albakin. Nonetheless, the conclusion is a shocker with profound implications about the Wanderers and the peoples they visited these many millennia ago....more

First of all a warning: do not read the annotation for this book here on Goodreads. It is in Russian, but Google does an acceptable job translating it. It contains a huge spoiler for something that is revealed after about two thirds of the book.

In the far future humanity explore distant planets while encountering different life forms on some of them. The scouts of the explorers are called Progressors and are highly trained in all forms of self-defense. One of these Progressors, Lev Abalkin secreFirst of all a warning: do not read the annotation for this book here on Goodreads. It is in Russian, but Google does an acceptable job translating it. It contains a huge spoiler for something that is revealed after about two thirds of the book.

In the far future humanity explore distant planets while encountering different life forms on some of them. The scouts of the explorers are called Progressors and are highly trained in all forms of self-defense. One of these Progressors, Lev Abalkin secretly came back to Earth and for some reason it causes a lot of panic among high-ranking security people.

Maxim Kammerer works for a security agency. He is assigned to a task of finding Lev Abalkin. Actually, he has two tasks: to find the rogue Progressor and to figure out what sort of danger he poses on our planet. As he investigates, he realizes the extraordinary measures were taken by somebody to keep Lev Abalkin as far from Earth as possible.

It all might sound like a sci-fi thriller, but it is actually more mystery book set in the future with the main question: who is Lev Abalkin? The end of the book haunted me for a long time with a question: what would I do in Maxim Kammerer's place? After all the years since I read the book for the first time I still do not know the answer....more

This is the second book in the trilogy about the adventures of Maxim Kammerer. It poses an important ethical question - what sort of behaviour is acceptiple towards beings who come from other planets or worlds. How far can one go if these beings might be a threat to the humankind.I actually read this book, because I loved "The Inhabited Island", which is the 1st part of the trilogy. What I like about the Strugatsky's vision of the future is that it's positive. In their future, the planet is a hiThis is the second book in the trilogy about the adventures of Maxim Kammerer. It poses an important ethical question - what sort of behaviour is acceptiple towards beings who come from other planets or worlds. How far can one go if these beings might be a threat to the humankind.I actually read this book, because I loved "The Inhabited Island", which is the 1st part of the trilogy. What I like about the Strugatsky's vision of the future is that it's positive. In their future, the planet is a highly deleloped, harmonious place with no wars, conflicts or meaningless destruction....more

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.The book has an interesting noir mixed with science fiction atmosphere, but ultimately wasn't as exciting as I was expecting and the ending was disappointing.Firstly, it was difficult to understand the book's universe which made the beginning difficult to read.The book is not self explanatory as an American novel would be, not that it is a bad characteristic, actually I like when you have to discover the universe together with the main character as he is seeing it and without the strange out ofThe book has an interesting noir mixed with science fiction atmosphere, but ultimately wasn't as exciting as I was expecting and the ending was disappointing.Firstly, it was difficult to understand the book's universe which made the beginning difficult to read.The book is not self explanatory as an American novel would be, not that it is a bad characteristic, actually I like when you have to discover the universe together with the main character as he is seeing it and without the strange out of place explanatory sentences, after all it's the natural way, but while I was reading it, I felt that if I'd read Noon 22nd before, I would appreciate Beetle in the Anthill more.The little I could understand about the Noon world, proofed me it was a really interesting universe thought: humankind was so technologically developed that all physical and non intellectual labour were inexistent and careers like art, psychology and teaching were more appreciated (which is something interesting if you think about the book's soviet background and compare with the way today some left-wingers think about any kind of technology not as a quality of life improver, but as an evil job elimination tool...); there was some kind of government organization whose goal was to accelerate other sentient alien species' evolution; there was some battle between government ethical control over science's research and scientists liberty to search for knowledge; there was an alien species more developed that made the government divided about their intentions; unfortunately the necessity of spy/investigation agents was never explained.Secondly, the ideas under the plot were not mind blowing but not dull either, the "beetle in the anthill" theory (Albakin as a beetle put by the Wonderers in the middle of human species, the anthill, so they could study our behaviour) and the idea of if it was cruel or not to not tell someone about his identity if it could make the person mad, suspicious of himself and an outsider in his own home (to tell or not to Albakin if he is an possible weapon against human kind or not) were almost cool. Unfortunately, those cool ideas and universe were not enough to maintain me interested and excited as a noir novel was supposed to do.The main character did not convince me as a good investigator and his boss as someone so intelligent and important as he should be.I didn't care much about the main plot as I cared about Albakin's and the Bighead planet exploration subplot.But the biggest problem to me was the ending, it was inexplicably rushed (albakin running to the museum) and, I still don't know if it was because I didn't understood it, but the final paragraphs left the book with an open end that made me really really angry.In conclusion, it is a so-so science fiction noir book, with a little action, some good ideas in a very cool world, maybe good as a quick teenager reading or a short story, but not so good as a novel itself....more

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.Possibly my most favourite Noon Universe novel. It's got everything : A film noir-like tone, some pretty cool and immersive flashbacks and fictional documents, a few dastardly govermental and personal conspiracies going on, snarky Golovans (well just one, really, but Shchekn certainly knows how to steal the show, even from Max and Abalkin !). New answers about the enigmatic precursor civilization of the "Wanderers" are revealed and things really start to get set in motion.

Too bad that Maya GlumPossibly my most favourite Noon Universe novel. It's got everything : A film noir-like tone, some pretty cool and immersive flashbacks and fictional documents, a few dastardly govermental and personal conspiracies going on, snarky Golovans (well just one, really, but Shchekn certainly knows how to steal the show, even from Max and Abalkin !). New answers about the enigmatic precursor civilization of the "Wanderers" are revealed and things really start to get set in motion.

Too bad that Maya Glumova got demoted to a mere soap-operaish love interest, even though her life-long love-and-hate relationship with Abalkin thankfully isn't one-dimensional. But still... Can you say : Character derailment ? Also, Abalkin's true origins and mysterious past are blatantly hinted at in around the third quarter of the book, yet everybody (including good ol' Max) just skim the surface of the whole thing in their conversations. You could've been less cryptic guys, I already knew what's going on. You'd spare me some mild annoyances...

Other than that, the book is solid and immersive, as you'd come to expect from a Strugatsky novel (especially the retrospective bits about Abalkin's and Shchekn's old expedition in the eerie post-apoc ruins of Hope). Maxim is older than when we first met him in his involuntarily stay on Saraksh in Prisoners of Power, but he's as snarky and cynical as ever. Ditto Shchekn, the most amusing yet nuanced canine alien I've ever come across. :-) Needless to say, the only time Maxim and Shchekn meet each other is for a brief two pages - Arkadiy and Boris apparently realised that having the two characters share more "screen time" together would overload the novel with sheer snarky awesomeness. ;-D ...more

I was pretty excited when I read this story. Science fiction isn't my favourite genre, that's why I didn't expected to get pleasure from reading. Fans of science fiction must have liked this book very much.